SCHOOL BOARD QUESTIONS DARE

Questions over the effectiveness of the popular DARE anti-drug/alcohol
program in the schools has led the Board of Education to consider
developing its own program.

School board members also were startled to hear that the police
department re-established DARE classes last fall in the town's public
schools without informing School Supt. Irene Cornish.

DARE, which stands for "Drug Abuse Resistance Education," employs
police officers in school classrooms to teach children to resist peer
pressure to use drugs or alcohol.

Three issues caused concern for the board. One was that the DARE
program was only restored in some of the schools. Board members and
Cornish stressed that making sure all children receive the same
opportunities is a top priority.

Another is with DARE itself. Although the dare.com website reports
that use of drugs and tobacco by school children has decreased, there
is no scientific evidence to prove that DARE is effective or had
anything to do with the decline.

Finally, Cornish noted she successfully negotiated sched-ule changes
with the teachers union to increase the amount of instructional time
students receive, only to discover that, without her approval, the
police were using up the instructional time with DARE classes.

Cornish attributed the situation to a breakdown in communication. But
at a Liaison Committee meeting last month between Board of Education
and Town Council members, she said she had to remind Police Chief
Michael Imbro that she runs the school system.

Board of Education Co-chairman Thomas Malloy said he thought Cornish
had been too "genteel" about Imbro's bureaucratic faux pas. He said
his "head would explode" if he were in her shoes. "What about the
chain of command?" he asked.

Cornish said she has a good relationship with Imbro, and the police
chief was chagrined over the matter.

For his part, Imbro said he believed Cornish knew the program was
restarting in the schools.

He said after DARE was discontinued nearly two years ago, town
officials received two dozen letters from PTA leaders and other
parents requesting it be restored.

Councilman Gavin Forrester III (D-3) suggested the whole thing might
have originated in Town Hall.

DARE was a casualty of budget cuts in 2005 when the Town Council
approved less money than Imbro had requested for the police
department's budget. Prior to that, the department had a full-time
police position responsible for DARE and a handful of other special
programs.

The council didn't actually make the cut itself. Instead it directed
then-Town Manager Benjamin Branyan to carve $600,000 from the budget
- -- cuts that the councilmen never discussed or voted on.

When Branyan implemented his cuts, groups of residents appealed
unsuccessfully to have some of them rescinded, including the layoffs
of an animal control officer and the blight enforcement officer, and
cancellation of the DARE program.

Forrester said that during 2006, the Town Council asked Mayor James R.
Miron to restore DARE. Imbro said it was a priority of Miron's, "and
it was one of mine, also."

This year, Forrester said he expects Imbro to ask for funding to hire
up to 10 new police officers.

Cornish said DARE re-appeared last fall at Franklin, Lordship and Eli
Whitney elementary schools and at Wooster and Flood middle schools.

She said police officials arranged the classes directly with the
school principals, who believed Cornish had signed off on them.

Board of Education Co-chairman Laura Hoydick said she and Imbro
discussed restoring DARE, and she made it clear the board was
committed to making sure all schools have the same programs in order
to be "fair and equal to all."

Cornish called the previous practice of having programs in some
schools and not in others an "ad-hocracy."

Imbro said the inequality is only apparent, not real. The DARE program
is now provided by two officers part-time on an overtime basis.

The manpower shortage means the 10-week course cannot be given in all
the town's schools at the same time, but all schools eventually will
have it, the police chief said.

None of that resolved the issue over DARE's effectiveness. Forrester
noted that it is popular with many parents, but scientific studies
have failed to determine that it affects children's use of drugs or
alcohol. Instead the studies suggest it is a "feel good" program, he
said.

Forrester said the Town Council has asked Deputy Police Chief Joseph
LoSchiavo for copies of the studies.

If the studies show DARE is ineffective, some alternatives might be to
replace it with a program developed by MADD (Mothers Against Drunk
Driving), or local police and educators might develop their own drug
and alcohol awareness program.

Cornish said a locally developed program might include reading and
writing components that would support the school system's curriculum
goals, something DARE does not have.

Imbro said his officers will work with educators to develop a course,
if that's what the school board wants.

Personally, he said, he feels DARE is effective, and many parents have
told him they're glad their children took the course.